Nifty Comics Online

Greetings!

I get a lot of emails asking me about my thoughts on the state of the comic industry in general and about the state of the indy side of the industry in specific. It’s funny that I get this email because my actual involvement with the industry is very limited — I don’t really sell to many comic shops, I only do a couple of convention appearances a year and those are generally science fiction oriented ones (go BayCon!) and I don’t really participate in any of the thousands of comic message boards out there (sure, sometimes I get sucked in to posting a couple of responses on the Dimestore forums, but the overall attitude of comic “fans” these days really turns me off).

Now that I’ve written a few times about what I’ve done in order to get Cadre comic book sales up in nearly the 9000 copies sold per issue range the emails have changed focus to “what about comic book distribution.” The problem with emails like that is what the writer is actually saying between the lines: “Okay, now you’ve told me that selling comics on my own is hard work and I’m a lazy bastard, tell me how someone can create a new distributor because my books weren’t good enough to be picked up by Diamond.” Or “were picked up by Diamond but I don’t support my books with marketing or money to make them successful.”

Truthfully, for the industry as it is now, Diamond is great. Sure they don’t support indy books, but why should they? The majority of indy publishers think “advertising” or “marketing” means to set up an account on Myspace or ComicSpace. Sure they might be doing a couple of conventions or take their books around to some local shops so they can act like “big men on campus,” but they have no clue what it takes to run a successful business.

Note: I’m not talking about “art for art’s sake” comic book publishers. Those guys are fine. They put their books out and don’t worry or care about sales. Although I do think the mentality can be a bit of a cop out for those who don’t or can’t succeed.

If you’re a small publisher and you want to sell more books, don’t blame Diamond. As a business they are going to support the accounts which produce money for them. I’m surprised they even accept all the indy publishers they do — 99% of them are a waste of the print space. Think about it this way - if you ran a company, would you support the 5 vendors who make up 90% of your sales or would you waste your time and company resources try to administer to 300 other accounts which bring in the other 10%? One company with 1 million copies sold through you or fifty companies selling under 200 copies each? It makes good business sense that Diamond doesn’t support indy comics.

If you’re a small publisher and you want to sell more books, take a look at yourself. Are you treating your comic like a business? How much are you spending on advertising your books? Do you have enough funds to last for 2-3 years without making a profit? That’s what it takes for most real world businesses to become successful. The old addage “you have to spend money to make money” is very true.

Once you decide to publish a comic book you need to sit down and write up a business plan. Figure out a budget for yourself, lay down a series of goals/milestones, put together a marketing plan and get a new box of checks because you need to get ready to spend some cash. Free publicity is great but it won’t get you to success (unless all you’re wanting to do is get noticed by a bigger company and get work with them — that is different from building a successful comic book). You also need to put together some market research on exactly what your target demographic is. You need to know who you’re going to be selling to. If you say “18-25″ and are selling through Diamond then you don’t know your market. The average comic buyer age skews quite a bit higher than that these days. The reason you need to identify your market is because you use that information to properly target your ad and marketing campaigns. If you’re publishing a horror comic then your market is horror fans…and incredibly easy demographic to sell to.

Now that you have your potential readers identified then you move online. Buying a domain and getting a web host are just the tip of the iceberg. Everyone has a website. My 75 year old mother has a website. The trouble is, no one is going to be looking for yours. Other comic creators might stumble on to your site from a directory link somewhere or that cool banner you have in your forum signature, but comic creators visiting your website really don’t do you any good. They’re poor or cheap and are more interested in seeing what they can swipe from your site than in buying your comic. You want mainstream eyes on your website and not only do they not know your comic exists but they may not even realize comic books are still around at all.

Here are some things you should know:

• If you’re a comic book publisher and you don’t know what SEO is then you’re in trouble. SEO, or Search Engine Optimization, is how you format your website and its content to rank well with certain keywords in places like Google, MSN and Yahoo (there are others, but those are the big ones). What are those “certain keywords” you ask? Those are dependant upon the product you’re putting out (your comic) and are based on its content and what your target demographic are. I’m not going to get in to the nuts-and-bolts of SEO because there are tons of resources for it online. I will give you one piece of advice — “comics” and “comic books” are generally worthless search terms on their own. They are tire-kicker words for people searching for something very different than what you are selling. Trust me.
• If you’re a comic book publisher and you aren’t familiar with Google Adwords (MSN and Yahoo also have their versions, but Google is the big boy and will count for at least 50% of your starting traffic, if not more) then you’re in trouble. Adwords is one of the best places to get your name out in front of web surfers and will let you rank on page 1 of Google on those keywords you don’t rank well on with your SEO. Adwords campaigns work fabulously for higher price point items like comic trade paperbacks. Nifty Comics does really well using Adwords as a means to promote and sell our DVD feature film, “BITE ME, FANBOY.” Master the use of Adwords and you’ll be a very happy publisher.
• If you’re a comic book publisher and you aren’t familiar with internet marketing techniques like article directories, tagging, blog directories, or link campaigns then you’re in trouble. If you don’t know what the terms PR, PPC, CPA or CPC then you shouldn’t be online.
• If you’re a comic book publisher and you aren’t maintaining a mailing list (online and off) then you’re in a lot of trouble.
• Finally, if you’re a comic book publisher with a trade paperback (or other higher priced product) and you don’t have an affiliate program for it, then you’re a fool. If you don’t know what an “affiliate program” is then you’re a moron.

The whole point of this rant is to say “Diamond doesn’t need to be fixed…comic publishers do.”

Oh, and before I forget, sign up for Google Checkout. All order processing is free for 2007 and that will save you anywhere from 2%-8% per order, depending on who you are currently using to process your credit card or Paypal orders. That may not sound like much, but it adds up.

-Mat Nastos
http://www.niftycomics.com

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